PNG is preparing itself for a massive windfall from the Exxon-Mobil led Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) project, due to go online in 2014.
The project is expected to push PNG's economic growth above 20 per cent - potentially making the Pacific island nation the fastest growing economy in the world. In preparation for this, the government of Peter O'Neill in late 2013 introduced its second deficit budget in as many years, plunging the country into the red to the tune of $US5.6 billion with the aim of delivering desperately needed basic services to the nation's seven million people. He has also put companies on notice that large scale resource projects will have to deal with a more activist government. "I don't want us to be a `passive' investor in the projects we hold equity in on behalf of the nation," he told a Mining and Petroleum Seminar in Port Moresby in early December . "The government will be a participant in new projects - that is not socialism, it is common sense. And it is what our law provides for and what our people expect." With the political instability of late 2011 and early 2012 now long behind him, Mr O'Neill has emerged as the nation's most powerful prime minister, at the helm of 104 MPs out of 111. This has been aided in part by the country's weak opposition, which has become, essentially, a running joke. AAP Comments are closed.
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